"HiTEC 039 full group": HiTEC (Histrionic Thought Experiment Cooperative) was originally proposed as "Sonic Aughts Union" by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE after a May 2008 gig in the Carnegie Public Library Oakland branch with separate sets by t,ac; Margaret Cox; Rick Gribenas; & Steve Boyle. The name was a take-off on the Sonic Arts Union, a group that t,ac admired. The original SAU had 4 main members who only did solo pieces & never collaborated with each other. This struck t,ac as a short-coming that he hoped to correct in this 2nd SAU. When "Sonic Aughts Union" failed to materialize as cONVENIENCE originally imagined, it transformed into HiTEC & into more orchestral dimensions. Its 1st rehearsal was on July 14, 2008. In an attempt to document every rehearsal, mini-dv was shot, sometimes w/ 2 cameras, sometimes w/ the camera(s) only on (a) tripod(s), sometimes w/ camera operators - & explanatory titles have been added. The numbers in the title represent the number of the session/rehearsal & the letters represent the sub-group of HiTEC that was rehearsing. There were as many as 3 sessions/rehearsals a week, tENT was the person conducting all of those (with 3 exceptions) & tENT asked that all "Systems Managers", as the players were called, rehearse at least 8 times before being considered ready for public performance - which amounted to, roughly, one rehearsal every 2 weeks. Some of the Systems Managers seemed to consider themselves 'too good' to have to rehearse so much. They were wrong. Many people came & went, auditioning with us only once & then deciding it wasn't for them. Originally, tENT had wanted to have dancers but the people who initially tried to participate as such didn't like it. It was probably too conceptual for them. HiTEC, at its peak, had 22 members although all 22 never played at once. The highest amount ever playing together was 21 at our 2nd gig.
This 39th incarnation consisted of: tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE: grand piano, effected WoF; Johan Nystrom: extended percussion amplified thru electric guitar; Hyla Willis: erhu; Ben Harris: violin; Dave Bernabo: acoustic guitar, homemade kracklebox made by dave kuzy; Kerrith Livengood: flute; Jonathan Brodsky: monome with mabalhabla software; Spat Cannon: acoustic bass; James Gyre: drum kit; Kenny Haney: bass clarinet; Roger Dannenberg: trumpet; Ben Opie: alto sax, thingamgoop (from kit); Julian Krishnamurti: electric bass; Unfinished Symphonies: electronic keyboard; Dani Simmonds: banjo-uke; William Wedler: percussion; Joy: acoustic guitar; Erok: trombone; Melissa St. Pierre: amplified toy piano. This was the largest rehearsal yet with 19 Systems Managers. Various crawl text explications run throughout the document many things much more understandable than they would be otherwise. tENT's edit is the most sophisticated yet but there's not much to be done to correct the non-attendance of the cameraperson & the malfunctioning of one of the cameras. Making matters even worse there's the typo of "toally" instead of "totally" & something like "get" where it shouldn't be ("to get accentuate the cacophony"). Despite these problems, this is a fantastic rehearsal & is the closest yet to what t,ac had been striving for for 4 months now. If anyone can follow what's going on they might find it to be a source of some perverse intellectual hilarity. By this point, tENT more or less had all the complicated procedures memorized. This isn't a feat likely to be duplicated anytime soon.
- April 26, 2019 notes from tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE
